WASHINGTON — The National Archives is partnering with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to recruit citizen scientists to help transcribe weather data from historic ship logs.

The Old Weather Arctic project being announced Wednesday involves ship logs preserved from the U.S. Navy, Coast Guard and other voyages in the Arctic between 1850 and World War II.

The logs were recently digitized at the National Archives.

Climate scientists could eventually use weather data from the ship logs to study climate patterns from the past. The logbooks also contain information on U.S. maritime history, scientific explorations, military operations and dramatic rescues and shipwrecks at sea.

The National Archives says the digitization project is part of the Obama-Medvedev Commission, which supports cooperation between the U.S. and Russia in science and other areas.